PHP-Nuke License Conclusion?

Hello,
I found the thread at
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200302/msg00164.html
regarding the licensing information on PHP-Nuke. Unfortunately, I was
unable to find a conclusion/consensus on the issue. As an end user of this
program, can anyone tell me if this program qualifies as Free Software? I
do not wish to spew out a "powered by PHP-Nuke" footer on every page. I do
not believe that this is in the spirit of the GPL at all. I wish to display
credits on a seperate page on my site, not as a footer on every page.
Am I allowed to do this? Is the PHP-Nuke author allowed to force the users
to display messages on all their web pages? I will move to a different CMS
if this is the case.
Thank you for your time and assistance.